


lessons to learn in loving your idols

by wartransmission



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Character Study, Fluff, Introspection, M/M, Victor-centric, Viktor POV, Yuuri POV
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-26
Updated: 2017-12-18
Packaged: 2018-12-19 23:59:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11908953
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wartransmission/pseuds/wartransmission
Summary: People like to believe that Yuuri and Viktor are indomitable and impeccable as an example of how love should be.People also tend to forget, in much the same way that Yuuri has, just how difficult it can be to love someone who you thought you knew for a little more than a decade, but never actually did until you managed to worm your way into their life and love.[In which Yuuri is also guilty of being fooled by Viktor's masks, and Viktor has his own off-days.]





	1. understanding the humanity in man-made idols

_i. Understand that they are people, not gods made flesh for mortals to revere and treat as though they were never human._

 

 

Yuuri knows this, but he forgets, sometimes. He remembers this when Viktor stumbles in trying to keep up with him, remembers this when Viktor makes him cry, remembers this especially well when Viktor sheds his own tears because of his selfishness in choosing to retire without prior warning.

Viktor is real, in these moments. He’s human- _flawed_ \- and Yuuri forgets to see him as the same god who gave him the ambition to compete on an international scale.

But Yuuri is imperfect, in much the same way Viktor is. He still forgets, at times, that Viktor has always been more than his image, more than a flirty smile, _human._

He forgets when Viktor sends a wink his way, shoots a smile at him that doesn’t conceal his desire, lets his mouth play with words that are more fitting a playboy than the romantic man who likes to cuddle up to him in a cry for affection. He forgets because he is, much the same, just human, and he’s never been immune to seeing the mask more than the person.

He forgets because for all that Viktor loves him, façades worn for a decade and longer are too tangled in his true heart to be dismissed completely. It’s even more difficult when Yuuri has admired and followed after an image for so long; for a little more than 12 years, that mask was all he’d known.

But he tries, is the thing.

Like now, where he has to reach out to steady Viktor as he reaches the rink side barrier because he’s exhausted. Because, for all the insanity it entails, he still chose to pursue coaching alongside competing because it’s what he wanted.

(Viktor would disagree, but Yuuri is particularly stubborn about believing the sparkle he’d seen in Viktor’s eyes at seeing the others skate. His eyes wouldn’t _lie_.)

“We should take a break,” Yuuri says, worrying on his lip as he watches Viktor wiping at the sweat dripping down his face.

Viktor laughs, shaking his head as he smiles up at him. “I really can’t keep up with you, Yuuri,” he says, voice coming off weak and more breath than actual sound as he takes the water bottle Yuuri hands over to him. “Your stamina is impossible!”

“Maybe you’re just getting old,” Yuuri says wryly, stifling a snort of laughter when Viktor throws him a wide-eyed and furrowed brow look of betrayal. “I’m not wrong, though,” he says, looking down at his hands as he fidgets with his thumbs. He waits for Viktor to finish drinking, waits for him to put on his skate guards, waits for him to sit on one of the nearby benches until his mouth can’t help it anymore and he begins to say, “How long…”

“Yes?” Viktor says, lilting tone and all as he looks up to smile at him. Yuuri smiles a lopsided smile at how impossibly cute he is, though it doesn’t keep him from feeling nervous at the ridiculousness of the question he’s going to ask.

After a subtle intake of air and a casual look off to the side as he takes a seat beside him, he asks,

“How long are you planning to skate?”

There’s a long, drawn-out silence.

Yuuri turns to finally look at Viktor, sees the flicker of surprise and something indescribable cross his face, and immediately regrets ever asking. He knew that it was ridiculous, but to see Viktor halt all too seriously at a simple question- it’s like Pandora opening the _pithos_ that gave humanity its evils and not quite understanding just what it was she opened, but understanding all the same that she should have left it closed.

“I didn’t mean to make it sound like I was,” he says, stumbling over his words, “I just thought-“

“You’re my fan,” Viktor says, tone dry and soft with something too mellow to be classified as affectionate as he smooths a hand down his one leg. “And it’s cute, that you are. It’s not surprising that you’d be interested like anyone else is on how long I plan to stretch my legacy. It’s fine,” Viktor says, a bland smile on his face that Yuuri can’t place, up until he realizes that it’s a look he’s only ever seen on magazines and interviews. It’s been so long since he’s last seen this expression on his face that it’s almost unrecognizable- like this Viktor isn’t _his_ Viktor, who has never treated him to this smile in a long, long time (if he ever _did_ in the first place).

“It’s not fine,” he blurts out, saying aloud the thought that had immediately sprang to mind at the look on Viktor’s face. “Do you,” he swallows, throat dry, “do you even want to continue skating? I thought, when you said that you felt like our world records were a diss, that you wanted to compete again. But is that really it? Did you- did I misunderstand?”

Viktor is silent when he finishes speaking. Yuuri feels his heart drop in those 2 seconds of silence, his chest constricting as he tries to digest the fact that he may have had a hand in pushing Viktor to do something he didn’t even want to do.

“You didn’t misunderstand anything,” Viktor assures him, and it’s like that moment in Barcelona all over again, when he’d lost their bag of nuts and he felt patronized by Viktor’s blasé treatment of his distress. Still, Viktor goes on to say, “I did- I _do_ want to continue skating, because of you.”

“Competitively,” he says, voice firm and incorrigibly stubborn for all that it hurts him. “Do you still want to skate competitively, or did you feel forced to?” _Because of me,_ he doesn’t say, though it seems to be clear enough from the slightest twitch around Viktor’s jaw hinting at clenched teeth.

“Yuuri,” Viktor begins, voice soft as though trying to soothe a wounded animal.

Yuuri responds accordingly.                                                               

“Stop lying to me and treating me like I’ll break if you say what I don’t want to hear,” he snaps as he comes to a stand, enough ire in his blood that he actually comes close to baring his teeth.

Viktor stares at him, wide-eyed and brows furrowed down the middle. Then his gaze goes hard, what warmth there was fading into cool firmness as he stands up to tower over him and says, “I love you, Yuuri,” Viktor says, and Yuuri’s heart _jumps_ at  finally hearing those three words from Viktor’s mouth after months of skirting around it, even if it’s in the context of an argument. Yet, Viktor goes on to add, unfinished, “But have you ever considered that maybe, _maybe_ , I just want to do things that will make you happy, because it makes _me_ happy? That maybe I do these things because I don’t want you to _leave_?”

Yuuri gawps at him. “ _What?_ ”

There’s a terrifying glassiness to Viktor’s eyes, hinting at tears that are close- so _close_ \- to falling, that it makes Yuuri’s chest clench tight in horror at having done this to him. Viktor says, “Is it not possible, for you to be happy just knowing that I love you this much? It was never in the plan for me to come back, but you wanted me to, and it’s not a hardship for me to stay for longer because that would make you happy.” Then he shrugs, casually raising a hand to wipe at the brimming tears in his eyes, and adds, “It’s not easy, I admit, to coach and compete at the same time- but it’s not anything that I can’t handle.”

Yuuri makes to retort, mouth already opening for a response, up until he twitches in surprise when a few whispers manages to breach their little bubble they’d thought to be private. They’re in Russian, quick and incomprehensible to his ears, until his mind manages to latch onto some words and he understands-

“ _Are they fighting?_ ”

“ _What are they talking about?_ ”

“Let’s,” he says, swallowing as he reaches out to tug at the hem of Viktor’s sleeve, effectively breaking the hard façade that had overtaken Viktor’s expression. “Let’s go, please.” _I don’t want anyone else to hear this_.

“…alright,” Viktor concedes, smiling softly, almost sadly, before sitting back down to unlace his skates. It feels like hours of Yuuri’s skin crawling and heart thudding out of beat when Viktor finally gets into his running shoes; he only hopes he doesn’t look like a scared mouse when he starts to walk out and into the empty halls with the hope that Viktor will follow after him.

There’s an illusion of silence over them as they walk, even through the buzzing noise in his head drowning out the voices that had grown in volume behind them both. His thoughts are crowded in on each other, cramped in the spaces of his mind, and Yuuri just wants to understand-

how could Viktor ever think he’d _want_ to leave _?_

“I’m sorry.”

Yuuri stops walking when he says it, pausing for only a fraction of a second before he turns around to look at Viktor. Like a siren song tying his heart to Viktor’s every breath, the very core of him gets pulled along into Viktor’s orbit, taken in and utterly captivated just from one look. He says, trying his hardest not to let his voice tremble, “I just- I don’t want you to come back just because _I_ want you to. I saw you watching everyone else during the GPF, and I thought-”

“You assume a lot of things, my Yuuri,” Viktor says, a quiet kind of amused that belies his earlier frustration. “Maybe you should ask first before you put words in my mouth and thoughts in my head, yes?”

“Sorry,” he chokes out again, compliant as he lets Viktor tug him into his arms. “I just,” he says, struggling to find the right words as Viktor presses kisses along the crown of his head, “I didn’t want you to regret ever choosing me. I didn’t want you to feel like I was keeping you from something you loved.”

“But I love you,” Viktor murmurs.

Yuuri is surprised that the earth isn’t shaking from how hard his heart is beating in his chest. He certainly feels shaken down to his core just hearing Viktor _say_ those words.

“Everyone was equally beautiful out on the ice when I watched, true,” Viktor continues, idly stroking Yuuri’s hair as he leans to rest his cheek by Yuuri’s temple. “But I was fine, just being your coach. Then you told me that you wanted to _end_ what we had, just because you assumed that I loved skating more than being with you, which is _untrue_ -” he emphasizes this with a drawn-out kiss to Yuuri’s hair, and Yuuri tries not to cry, “- and I thought, if it could truly make you happy to see me skate again, if that would make you stay with the sport that you love, I’d do it and simultaneously get rid of any regrets I have of leaving. It would be fine, I thought.” He pauses, gently soothing Yuuri with the warm touch of his hand over his head, then says, “I didn’t think I’d worry you this much. For that, I’m sorry.”

“No,” Yuuri mumbles, shaking his head just slightly so he doesn’t disturb Viktor from leaning against him. “It’s not your fault that I assumed things.” Face heating and likely pink with embarrassment, he says, “I should know better than to assume when I could ask.”

“They _do_ say that communication is key,” Viktor hums, the smile on his face more heard than seen as he nuzzles his cheek into Yuuri’s temple. “And we’ve not been communicating all that well in words, I think.”

“Not all that well, but I think we’ve done surprisingly okay so far,” Yuuri says, smile wobbly but affectionate on his lips as he looks up at Viktor. Viktor smiles back instantly, like it’s instinct to when faced with Yuuri’s smile, and Yuuri’s heart calms all too easily at the sight of him. “We’re still together, aren’t we?” he asks.

“You’ve done well to skate out your love,” Viktor teases, hands coming up to wipe away the tears escaping Yuuri’s eyes. Then he presses forward, kissing Yuuri’s forehead, and Yuuri surprises him once again by doing the same thing. It’s barely a blink of a second of Viktor pulling away before Yuuri tugs him down by his shirt to press a kiss to his forehead; Yuuri doesn’t even need to see the besotted look on Viktor’s face to know how happy it makes him.

Yuuri says, smiling softly, “I’d say that we managed to communicate somewhat, even if it wasn’t in words.”


	2. understanding the vulnerability inherent to humanity

“Viktor?”

“Yes?” Viktor says, leaning over the Ice Castle’s rinkside barrier, not at all embarrassed as he presses an eskimo kiss to Yuuri’s nose upon his approach. His smile is bright, warm and loving, but there’s something soft to it; not quite sad, as it is just-

_longing_.

“Are you okay?” he asks, not bothering to don a smile as he comes closer, resting his cool, gloved hands over Viktor’s own on the barrier.

“I’m perfect,” Viktor answers, sliding his hands out of Yuuri’s clasp so he can clasp Yuuri’s hands for himself, raising them to press sweet kisses to his knuckles. There’s no lie in his words, Yuuri can tell, _and yet_. “Happy as a coach can ever be. We can still improve on the transition of the quad flip, but-”

“Not that,” Yuuri insists, lips drawing into a slight moue as he gives Viktor an affectionately exasperated look. “I know where I’m falling short at. If anything, I’ve gotten better at criticizing myself with your help.”

A concerned expression passes over Viktor’s face, and Yuuri quickly clarifies, getting his hands out of Viktor’s grasp to wave them around in dismissal, “I mean that in a good way! I’m improving more easily because now I can see where I should improve, and how.” His lips tremble with a smile, and he adds, “It helps that you’re frank, really. Even if the average person might not take it so well.”

“ _Yuuri_ ,” Viktor grumbles, lips pursed. “Am I really that bad?”

“Oh, yes,” he admits, smiling in amusement at the offended look on Viktor’s face, “it would break the heart of a weaker man, really.” Then he slides close to press a peck to Viktor’s lips, sliding right back before Viktor can deepen the kiss, and says, “Luckily, I’m a little stronger than that.”

Viktor looks torn for a few seconds between affront and happiness, before the happiness wins over everything else. “Yes, you are,” he hums, clearly proud as he squeezes Yuuri’s hands in his hold. “My Yuuri is the strongest there is.”

“I wouldn’t take it that far,” Yuuri muses, smile growing when Viktor raises an eyebrow at him. “You’re just as strong, if not stronger. You’ve had more years of victory than I have.”

Again, the wistfulness flickers in Viktor’s gaze and smile, enough that Yuuri can be sure that it wasn’t just a trick of the light the first time he caught it. “And now you’re to continue my legacy, hm?” Viktor says, not stopping Yuuri when he pulls out of his hold to slide over to the rink side exit. Dutifully, he picks up the skate guards from the barrier and hands them over for Yuuri to wear, saying, “Though you have to admit, you have better stamina than I do.”

“I always have better stamina than you do,” Yuuri teases, letting Viktor follow after him as he heads for a nearby bench to sit on. “And I wouldn’t be sure about continuing your legacy. I’m not Russian, for one. If there’s a better fit for continuing your legacy, it would be Yurio.” He makes to untie his skates but Viktor gets there first, kneeling by his feet as he shoos away Yuuri’s gloved hands to take care of the knot on his own. Yuuri barely stifles a laugh at him, and says, “And, if anything, I’m making a legacy of my own. It just so happens that you’re helping.”

“Yuuri!” Viktor cries, pausing mid-knot on his right skate to give him a sunny, love-struck look.

“Some of that pride’s got to rub off, somehow,” he muses, smiling down at him as Viktor smiles his own heart-shaped smile at him. “I’m just not sure if that’s a good thing.”

“Of course it’s a good thing,” Viktor insists, looking all too determined as he finishes unlacing Yuuri’s right skate and slides it off his bruised foot. “You _should_ be proud of yourself. You’ve accomplished so much, even before I began to help, and you shouldn’t dismiss that.”

“The people from Hasetsu certainly never let me forget that,” Yuuri says dryly, sighing as he watches Viktor unlace his left skate. “The pressure can be a bit much, but I suppose that’s what people do when they want to show off their hometown.”

“They’re not just proud of you because you’re from Hasetsu, you know,” Viktor says, giving him a look before he turns his attention back down to sliding Yuuri’s skate off his foot. “They know that you’re great. Why wouldn’t they be proud when you’ve managed to win on a national and international level?”

“Mm, I guess,” he concedes, smiling softly as Viktor gently tugs both of his socks off.

“You should know that, Yuuri,” Viktor tuts, mock-frowning at him as he gently massages the soles of his bruised feet. “You’re loved, here. For all that you don’t believe it, I’m not sure where else you could have grown to become the great skater that you are without this place to call home.”

“It’s your home now too,” he says in reminder, smile half-tremble on his lips when Viktor looks up at him with the eyes of a lost man just now finding home. “I still can’t believe it, sometimes, that you’re mine. That I can share my home with you, and that you can be so happy with it. With _me_. I never thought I’d see the day that you would come to where I grew up, where I first learned to love skating, and you’d ever call it home, but here you are.”

“Here I am,” Viktor says, voice small and tremulous as Yuuri slowly, gently, reaches out to cup his cheek. “I’m so glad I found you,” he murmurs, closing his eyes and leaning into Yuuri’s touch, so openly vulnerable that Yuuri feels his heart ache at the sight of him.

“I’m glad I found _you_ ,” he says, leaning over and cupping both of Viktor’s cheeks so he can press a kiss to his forehead, his eyes, his nose, and his mouth. “I can’t even imagine a world where I never knew you. I don’t think I’d even be the same person that I am now, without you in my life.”

“I don’t think I’d ever be as happy as I am now without you in my life,” Viktor says, and Yuuri feels the tears brim in his eyes as he smiles a wobbly smile at him. He watches Viktor stand up, lets him have his own turn at cupping his cheeks and pressing a kiss to whatever patch of skin he can find on his face without even bothering to hide how heart-wrenchingly happy it makes him when he heaves out a sigh. “Hasetsu would never have been home without you, Yuuri.”

“Don’t you miss it?” he asks, looking up at Viktor as he continues to memorize every inch of detail on his face, “Russia? Competing?”

There’s a beat of silence, of Viktor just looking into his eyes, before he seems to find what it was that he needed as he says, “I do. Terribly so, at times.” Then he smiles, so softly that Yuuri feels his heart quiver, and says, “It’s hard, when you’ve done one thing in your life for so long and been in one place for so long that it seems like it’s all that you could ever know. It’s hard, when it feels like there was only one thing that you could ever be good for.” He sighs, the breath so heavy from his body that Yuuri can see his chest move with it, “But I’m trying not to think that. After all, if skating was all I’m ever good for,” he pauses to stroke Yuuri’s cheek, eliciting a small, adoring smile in his direction, “I doubt that would have been enough to make anyone, much less you, stay.”

“I don’t like the insinuation that I could ever be any better than you as a human being in general,” Yuuri teases, even through the feelings weighing heavily on his chest at the thought of Viktor ever feeling lonely, or purposeless. He says, hoping Viktor understands, “But it’s true that you’re more than just your skating. I found you through it, sure, but I wouldn’t have fallen in love with you with just that.”

“My Yuuri is so sweet to me,” Viktor coos, smile so beautifully happy on his face that Yuuri feels his insides tremble with relief.

“Your Yuuri loves you a lot, so he better be,” Yuuri says, amused, before squeaking out a laugh when Viktor swoops in to embrace him and giving him a good, hard squeeze full of all the affection he can muster. “Viktor!”

“я тебя люблю,” Viktor says, voice a murmur as he presses a hard kiss to Yuuri’s temple, so much sincerity in his tone that Yuuri feels himself being _this close_ to crying if he so much as sees the sincerity on Viktor’s face.

「愛してる。」Yuuri answers in turn, smile wide when Viktor pulls back to stare at him in awe and raw affection.

“Yuuri,” Viktor begins, mouth opening and closing as he tries to figure out what he wants to say. “I…”

“You know what I mean, and I meant what I said,” Yuuri says, grinning when Viktor makes a low, undeniably happy noise before taking him into his arms again. “I love you that much, Viktor,” he says, voice slightly muffled as he nuzzles his face into the crook of Viktor’s neck and shoulder.

Viktor breathes out a sigh, soft and sweet, and Yuuri can’t help himself from standing up, burying himself further into Viktor’s warmth even with the chill of the floor on his bare feet. It’s worth it, if only for the way Viktor relaxes into the hug when he presses closer.

“I love you that much too, my Yuuri,” Viktor says, breath warm on the side of his head as he cradles him close by the nape. “No one can ever deny that.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translation Notes:  
> я тебя люблю = I love you in Russian  
> 愛してる = I love you in Japanese (note that it's aishiteru and not daisuki; generally ppl use the latter bc the former is heavier in meaning and not something u just throw around in a confession lol)


	3. understanding love through imperfections and past mistakes

Viktor has always had a love for surprises, but it’s never been a prerequisite for any of his lovers.

It’s something that’s only ever been for himself, lighting up his path in star-fire and moonlight on the way to victory. He doesn’t expect anyone to be like him— struggling, always, to be something new. He’s more than a dancer, a skater, in this way. He’s an actor in practice, smiles and winks and other gestures compartmentalized in his mind in a way that people don’t assume he would ever do.

They think Viktor Nikiforov, the Living Legend, is real. And he is, in his own way. Viktor the Living Legend is an image that he has played on the ice in the years past, but an image is often just as real as the original, even if it is lacking in some parts.

Viktor Nikiforov, the man, has always been so much more flawed.

He knows how to play at sadness in an imitation of the loneliness that continuously haunts him. And still, for all that he knows how feelings work in theory, he has never been good at actually dealing with them. To play at longing is one thing, but to see heartbreak and hurt in motion on Yuuri’s tear-streaked and flushed face is another thing entirely. To make things worse, he’s not that great with comforting people either, because he’s never really had much practice in the first place.

In his youth, whenever he truly cried, he had kept it all in the privacy of his room or a bathroom. There was the rare occasion that he’d play it up to get his way on something he really wanted, but beyond that, he’d often seen tears as a show of weakness.

He wasn’t deliberately taught to be like this. His parents were, and have always been, loving; in all his faults and shortcomings, they’d never taken him for granted or seen him as anything less than human for doing or not doing one thing.

He just…was.

By the time he’d realized how wrong he was, that crying was perfectly fine and human, he just wouldn’t anymore. He wasn’t so stubborn as to deliberately never cry, nor did his body have any problems with producing tears.

There just wasn’t a reason to cry. Not for a long, long time.

It’s easy, after all, to be used to being lonely.

It’s not so much him being awkward at making friends as it is just being difficult to keep up an image. Some people think he’s one thing over the other, a playboy or a high-and-mighty athlete, and others just don’t bother to even try and befriend him. He tries, _he does,_ because what use is being a Living Legend if you’re lonely? But his rink mates treat him as person to look up to, a rival, a goal to strive for—

an _image_.

But they’re family, nonetheless. Zhora, Milochka, Yurio (he’s never letting him live that nickname down, to be sure), and Yakov, among the many others, have been with him long enough to know that he’s just a flawed person in general, and never quite as perfect as the media makes him seem to be. They probably still have their misconceptions of him, his status as a playboy never quite as easy to shake off as he likes, but.

You can’t really train in the same home rink, share a few crashes, bruises, and skating tips, without finding family along the way.

Because of that, they know of his more terrible flaws, and they know enough to be able to protect him from his occasional bouts of inanity. Some have been with him longer than the others, especially Zhora, and it’s no surprise that he knows him enough to be able to save him from his own mistakes and lonelier thoughts.

Yuuri, who he’s personally known for only a year, has saved him from just as many, and all without ever quite knowing it.                                                                                           

He’s _needy_ and _eager to please_ for the right kind of person, is the thing. He’s stubborn most of the time, never willing to bend or bow for anything he doesn’t deem is worth his time, and he has a tendency for tactlessness that hurts people’s feelings without his always knowing it. But when he decides that he loves something, or someone, he is more than willing to give it his all, play a certain kind of person or sacrifice a bit of himself, just to ensure that that something _stays._

He wouldn’t be where he is, golden medals abundant in his immaculate and nigh-untouched home, if he wasn’t as passionate or determined as he was.

Yuuri, in all his stubbornness, loves him because of all of it. What began as the typical, with Yuuri falling into admiration with Living Legend Viktor Nikiforov, evolved into Yuuri teasing him, Yuuri laughing with him, Yuuri seeing all of his flaws and saying, “ _this is all mine to love_.”

Viktor loves him for it.

He doesn’t understand how anyone couldn’t.

And Yuuri, in all his seeming perfection, somehow manages to hit the one standard he’s always held himself up to when it isn’t even a standard he holds for any of his lovers.

He never fails to surprise Viktor.

Like now, in all his rumpled, sleep-hazy glory, with his brown eyes still soft with slumber and his mouth still re-learning words. He mumbles something under the blankets, shivers a bit, before humming and nuzzling his face into Viktor’s outer thigh and cuddling up to him.

Viktor hums a soft laugh. “What was that?”

Sleepily, Yuuri mumbles, “One person can’t be everything, Viktor.”

A pause.

“Where did that come from?” Viktor asks, voice soft as he toys with Yuuri’s black locks. It’s a non sequitur, by all standards, given that they weren’t even talking when Yuuri suddenly spoke up.

“Your thighs,” Yuuri begins, beautiful with his sleepy smile as he gives the thigh in his grasp a squeeze, “are hard.”

Viktor barely manages to hide a snicker. “And..?”

“You work so hard, _Viktoru_ ,” Yuuri murmurs, accent slipping into his name in a way that only makes Viktor love him a little harder. “It must be exhausting, to be so many things at once.”

“It’s never a hardship to do anything for you, солнышко, you should know this,” Viktor tells him, smiling still.

Yuuri wrinkles his nose at him, probably to try and look angry, but mostly it just makes him look adorably ruffled. “But I don’t _want_ you to exhaust yourself, especially if it’s because of me. I just want you to be happy, Viktor.”

“I _am_ happy,” Viktor says firmly, leaving no room for doubt as he leans down to press a kiss to the crown of Yuuri’s head. “And to be with you is happiness in itself, my Yuuri. To be your coach, or to compete against you— neither is too hard so long as I have you.”

“Then choose one or the other, please.” There’s a moment’s pause, with Yuuri shifting to hide his face in Viktor’s thigh, before he speaks again. “You’ve already given me so much. I don’t want to take even more from you.”

“Yuuri—”

“You don’t have to try so hard to make me stay,” Yuuri interrupts, peeking up at him through his mess of black hair and long lashes.  He looks soft, like this, and entirely too lovable. Viktor has never had much reason to cry in a long while, but seeing Yuuri like this— knowing that he _has_ this, that this person loves him enough to forgive him for his sin of making him cry— is good enough reason to start. “You don’t have to be everything just so I’ll love you. I already loved you even when you broke my heart that first time.”

“ _Yuuri!_ ” Viktor whines, one hand coming up to his chest in mock-betrayal. “I thought you forgave me for that!”

Yuuri snorts out a laugh. “Oh, I did. Doesn’t mean I’ll forget it.” He yawns, smacking his lips and wrinkling his nose as though trying to ward off his drowsiness. “Anyway, it’s impossible to try and be everything to me.”

“Is it really?” Viktor asks.

“Mm. You’ll never be able to do what Yuu-chan and Phichit-kun can do for me, after all.”

Viktor makes a wounded noise at that, though it’s not quite genuine as it is just playful. He knows just how important Yuuri’s friends are, and he wouldn’t begrudge them their place in Yuuri’s life and love. Still, he asks, “What can they do that I can’t?”

Yuuri makes a whine-like sound, before hiding his face into Viktor’s thigh. This isn’t much of an answer, and Viktor has never been one to give up that easily, so he prods at Yuuri by poking him in all his ticklish places- which is a fortunate find after those first few months of sleeping together! He will always treasure that knowledge for as long as he lives.

“ _Yuuri_ ,” he drawls, smiling widely as he pokes at him. “What’s so special about them?”

“ _Nngh._ ”

“ _Yuuuuri_.”

“It’s just,” Yuuri says, half-muffled as he initially keeps his face hidden, before turning over to cover the upper half of his face with both hands, “I can’t really _talk_ about how much I’m so lucky to have you to your face, or about how happy I am to be with you, because that’s _embarrassing._ They understand how I feel because they’ve always known how I admire you, and they admire you too, and it’s not as embarrassing to share that with them as it is with you.”

Viktor stares at him.

Yuuri is quiet for a little while, before hesitantly peeking out through the spaces between his fingers.

“Oh,” Viktor says belatedly, a slow-growing heat blooming on his cheeks as he puts a hand to his lips. Softly and very much smitten, he says, _“_ You _really_ love me that much, Yuuri?”

Yuuri makes a face at him, as though offended that Viktor would ever doubt it. And, in a direct contrast to his previous embarrassment at admitting to his adoration, he manages to say with a stubborn expression,

“I’ve _always_ loved you that much, Viktor.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i was hit with inspiration while walking home and then it spiraled out of my control (this was supposed to be a funny chapter hahaha why)
> 
> let me know in the comments if u liked it or if u have any suggestions!! ♥♥ thank u for reading!!

**Author's Note:**

> while i love katsuki yuuri with my entire being, i love viktor in equal measure and felt that it would be nice to write more on him in a character study through yuuri's eyes! it's pretty damn hard, given how unreliable yuuri is as a narrator lol
> 
> i hope u like it! i'd be especially grateful if u let me know in the comments what u liked/what u think i should fix/etc. ♥♥ thank u for reading! ( ´ ▽ ` )ﾉ


End file.
